Going Domestic

divinity of pizza?

On Friday, the three of us stopped for dinner at Coco Brooks. One of Chris's coworkers had recommended the pizza joint to us, and as a bonus, it's not too far from our home. The pizza is very good - all they make are little personal-sized pies in a terrific selection of meat-laden and veggie-only varieties. So many topping that they are always on the verge of sliding off of the crust. The thing that we are left curious about is this - why on earth do the bottom of the pizza boxes have the ten commandments on them?

pie in the sky

I really should have posted this eight days ago, but I took a pastry-making class over at the Cookbook Company two Saturdays ago, hoping that a hands-on class with an instructor to answer question would rid me of my pie-making fear. I think the class did the trick as I came out of the class with two quiches and two apple pies. The class covered both a lard-based pastry (we used Tenderflake) and butter-based pastry, and I have recipes for a few variations as well.  Very relieved that it's not as hard to recognize when the mixture of flour, fat, salt, and water is just right for patting together and rolling as I thought it would be. I had the chance to test out one of those fabulous silicone rolling pins when I was rolling out my crusts - I want one now, of course. But I don't really need one. It's much easier to justify the purchase of a pastry blender :)

bet the pilgrims never ate like this

I'm not sure if pilgrims really figure into the mix, but Thanksgiving in Canada happened this past Monday. As per tradition, Chris and I roasted a turkey that was larger than we really needed, and had our festive dinner on Sunday while my parents were visiting. We ate leftover turkey on Monday and Tuesday, but were getting kind of tired of it by the time Wednesday rolled around.  So what to do with last meal of leftover turkey? A quick peek into our pantry revealed a jar of butter chicken paste. I mixed about three tablespoons of the paste into a cup of milk, and then poured the mixture into my large blue casserole where I'd already put the rest of our leftover roast turkey. After an hour of 375 degree F oven-time, our Butter Turkey was spicy and tender. Not as good as anything from The Glory of India, but it defintely is our most tasty meal of Thanksgiving leftovers :)

Garden Reprieve

I found more space for tulips in our backyard, so I planted fifteen more bulbs the other day.  If they all come up, I don't think that we'll be filling in with many annuals next spring! I am trying out these varieties:

• Black Hero
• Negrita
• Blushing Girl
• Cloud Nine
• Antoinette

Two of them are"bouquet" tulips - apparently each stem has multiple blooms. I haven't seen any in real life, but they looked neat in the photo at the garden centre.

Shrubs were also being cleared out at 50% off the regular price, so I picked up a drawf burning bush for $15. If it doesn't survive the next year, I can get a credit for the $15 from the garden centre, so that's not bad. I've never planted a shrub before, so it's kind of scary and exciting!

Extreme Makeover

I think that we've spoiled our house this year.  Okay, repairing the leaky roof (that the previous homeowners did not disclose at the time of sale, thank you very much) was a necessity, but our latest expenditures were largely for curb appeal and comfort. Our house had cedar siding in the front, some of which had started to rot. So we had vinyl siding installed, with thick rigid insulation underneath. Our green house is now a deep beige and I dare the vinyl to start decaying!  We also had a mid-efficiency furnace installed last Friday, replacing the thirty-six year-old Chrysler one in our basement. That upgrade is really nice. The old furnace lasted two winters for us, both of which we spent worrying about having enough cash to replace it. Now we don't have to worry.

The nice thing about our year of spending on the house is that we were able to get our post-evaluation period for the EnerGuide rebates extended. I'm going to call about setting up another energy audit tomorrow, hoping that our home's energy efficiency has improved enough to qualify us for about $300-500 back.

Putting the trowel away for the winter

Tulips are planted. I stuck them about eight inches deep, with a healthy dose of bone meal mixed into the soil. I'd earlier speculated that I didn't have any blooms this spring because the weren't planted deep enough (I probably only went six inches down), but now I think that my habit of trimming all of the foliage down after the blooms are gone was the culprit. I guess the foliage still nourishes the bulb for the season. Kind of annoying as I don't really like the appearance of saggy tulip leaves in my garden, but I don't really care for having to plant everything new every year, so I'll tough it out next year. I'm actually trying to plant the bulbs near other plants that will kind of disguise the limp leaves when they grow and green up themselves.

I am planning on 2006 being "The Year of the Garden" at our place. We have two places in our front yard where the flower beds are not very distinct and the grass in patchy. I'd love to extend them both, and fill one in with colourful phlox and the other with goutweed.  I have an envelope of seeds for lovely double-petaled pink poppies from my mother-in-laws garden, and there is a perfect spot in our backyard for a barberry shrub ...